


Bewail

by Lohrendrell



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Death, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Non-Linear Narrative, The Witcher Lore, Witchers Need Hugs (The Witcher)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-13 08:02:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29898072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lohrendrell/pseuds/Lohrendrell
Summary: "Geralt opened his eyes to the blinding brightness of the unknown, but he didn’t squint; his eye slits adjusted accordingly just a moment later. His muscles were relaxed and his heartbeat was at its slowest—he felt well-rested. He couldn’t remember when was the last time he felt so unperturbed."
Relationships: Cirilla Fiona Elen Riannon & Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia, Erland of Larvik & Jagoda
Comments: 5
Kudos: 15
Collections: The Witcher Flash Fiction Challenge #017





	Bewail

**Author's Note:**

> I have decided that Depeche Mode's _Enjoy The Silence_ is Erland and Jagoda's theme song.

If there is one thing to be learned from the study of spectral beings,  
it is that we all need to settle our grievances before we pass. (...) specters are  
truly the unquiet dead. They are ghostly spirits who appear to be caught  
between one world and the next, held here by sorrow, fury, and the need for revenge.  
The most powerful are usually female spirits wronged at important moments in their lives.  
(...) In the end it is probably best to find a witcher.  
  
― Brandon of Oxenfurt,  
_fragments of an unsent letter  
to an unknown recipient._  
—

  


I did my best to bury her mangled body in the  
makeshift graveyard the other prospects and I had built.  
  
— _Fragments of a journal  
by an unknown author._  
—

  
  
  
Geralt opened his eyes to the blinding brightness of the unknown, but he didn’t squint; his eye slits adjusted accordingly just a moment later. His muscles were relaxed and his heartbeat was at its slowest—he felt well-rested. He couldn’t remember when was the last time he felt so unperturbed.

The feeling didn’t last long.

“Where am I?” Geralt asked, eyeing all around.

A voice spoke near him. “Seems to me you’re here now. Nowhere else.” Geralt startled. The man was sitting near him—too near. How Geralt missed an entire man by his side was beyond him.

“Who are you?” Geralt sat up abruptly and checked if he still had his swords and other weapons tied to his body. He did.

“I could ask you the same thing,” the man said.

“Geralt of Rivia. Witcher.”

“Ah.” The man’s tone was a low, balmy one that could mean either sympathy or disinterest. “A witcher. Isn’t that quite something.”

“Well?” Geralt said.

“Well?” The man mimicked him—not mockingly, though also not with kindness.

“Where are we?”

The man moved his head, indicating vaguely at the direction ahead of them. “Look.”

Geralt looked.

“Describe what you see,” the man clarified.

“A field of cherry blossom trees.”

“And?”

Geralt crossed his arms. He was standing now, but the man hadn’t moved from his sitting position. “Trees aren’t very tall. White flowers. The petals are falling. Smell of nothing. I can’t… see the horizon. It’s all mist. Where are we?”

The man said nothing at first, just looked at the unseeable horizon, a small hint of a smirk in the corner of his mouth; he looked tranquil, almost dazed. Eventually, he said, “What an interesting question. Where are we, anyway? Can we ever really tell? Is it defined by where we stand, or where we are within ourselves? Is it defined by the limits of our goals, or our imagination, or the things we wanted but could never ever have? Do we lie on failure or settle ourselves into the path of prospected achievements, even when we’re unable to succeed? Are we forever trapped where others failed us?”

The man was crazy. Geralt had no time for this. He might not know where he was _now_ , but he’d remembered where he’d been before: searching for Ciri. The Isle of Mists. He’d found her, she was alive and well, and now he needed to find a way out of the place and back to Kaer Morhen.

Geralt turned around in a full circle, trying to find a clue, a direction, anything that could serve as a guide. There was nothing as far as his sight could reach—nothing except cherry blossom trees and petals blurred in the mist. 

He sighed.

“Won’t you tell me who you are?”

“Who am I?” His expression was of bewilderment, or maybe relinquishment. Geralt couldn’t know for sure.

He wasn’t looking at Geralt, but Geralt was looking at him. He was strange in a way that Geralt had known intimately his whole life. He looked like a Skelliger, with the typical Southern Skellige undercut and the tribal tattoo on his nape. Geralt used to see those kinds of tattoos all the time when he was a child in Kaer Morhen, in the adults coming back from and going out on the Path every year. For some, it was a matter of pride to register their grand deeds in their skin; for others, it was an honorable show of fidelity to the School; and a portion just enjoyed adorning their skin with beautiful patterns.

Geralt had been too young to be allowed to get one of those, and eventually he forgot about it.

“I…” the strange man started, but couldn’t continue.

* * *

“Here.”

“Where did you get that?”

“I stole some from the kitchens.”

“Don’t do that! They will have you beaten to a pulp if they find out!”

“So? What’s the difference from every other day?”

“...”

“That’s what I thought. Eat it. You need it.”

“You don’t want any?”

“You need it more than I do. Whatever they’re feeding us isn’t doing you any good.”

“Those stews are disgusting. Blergh.”

“I know. That’s why you need to eat this. Okay? You need to get stronger. I don’t know what they’re planning, but I know it’s nothing good. You need to get stronger.”

“...This is disgusting too.”

“I know. It’s all I could find.”

* * *

“I can tell you’re a witcher.”

The man finally looked at him, as if Geralt’s words had broken his stupor somehow.

“Ah. Is it the eyes that give it away?”

“Not really.” Geralt gestured at his own undercut. “Used to see quite a lot of those when I was a kid.”

“Oh?”

Geralt shrugged. “Used to like it. Fell out of style.”

“Time passes.”

“Indeed. I don’t recognize the medallion, though.”

“Ah. Medallions. It really became a thing, didn’t it?”

“Hm?”

“I told George and Raven to not go through with it. Not to succumb to the fad. It would be only a step further into distancing Arnaghad and the others from us. As if the gap between us wasn’t already wide enough.”

Geralt frowned. He knew some of those names; had read about them before. “How long have you been here?”

The man’s expression shifted. He had been looking at Geralt with a distant, but slightly curious light in his eyes. Now he looked uncomfortably disoriented. “I never meant for any of it to happen,” he said, “I never meant for us to split up. I—”

“Let me rephrase that,” Geralt interrupted. “I assume you took a contract. Am I right? When was that?”

Glassy eyes looked at Geralt, but there was no sparkle of sanity coming from them.

Geralt tried again, crouching in front of the man as if speaking to a child. “Listen, I want to help you. But I need to find my daughter. I think she might be here somewhere. I think we can help each other. Can you tell me where we are? Is this the Isle of Mists? Are you—are _we_ trapped in here?”

The man said nothing at first, just stared at Geralt. And then: “I can tell you’re a witcher too.”

“Really.” Geralt sighed. “The eyes gave it away? Or was it the swords?”

“No. It’s the aura of melancholy.”

* * *

Ciri woke up in a torpor not unlike the ones she felt whenever she hopped through dimensions. It had been years since she felt like this—the last time, she’d ended up running away with an eccentric little young woman, and living an unpredictable day-to-day life until Avallac’h found her.

Although it’d been a while since the last time she travelled through space and time in a frenzy, she still remembered the dizziness that accompanied that kind of endeavour. She didn’t recall feeling quite so drained, though.

She woke in a bed made of flowers, petals covering her entire body, realizing belatedly she was lying on the floor. Ciri sat up in the middle of nowhere, trying to piece together what was happening. She had trapped herself for days—or weeks?—in the Isle of Mists, trying to escape the Wild Hunt. They were still after her after all this time. Geralt found her, and then—

_Geralt._

Ciri got onto her feet. She did a full circle as she looked around. There was nothing in sight as far as her eyes could see, nothing except mist and a strange rain of white petals.

“Geralt?” Ciri called anyway, unsurprised when she received no answer.

Even so, she started walking.

* * *

“Did you know there are creatures out there who can grant us any wish?”

“Yeah?”

“Mhm. I read that in one of Alzur’s books.”

“You can read?”

“You can’t?”

“Mah never really taught me. Crewmates didn’t care. Deckhands don’t really need to read.”

“It’s easy. I can teach you if you want.”

“Mhm.”

“Don’t make that face.”

“Ouch! Don’t poke me! Stop laughing!”

“Don’t make that face. It’s easy, you’ll see. I’ll teach you.”

“How did you get to read one of Alzur’s books anyway?”

“He gave it to me. Told me to read and learn whatever I could.”

“Why?”

“Dunno. So we don’t let monsters in? There were only monsters in that book.”

* * *

There was a girl in the middle of that misty nowhere.

She couldn’t be older than eleven or twelve. Tiny and malnourished. She was crouching, fists clenched in front of her eyes, weeping with abandon. Petals rained over her, sticking to her hair, and embellishing her worn out clothes.

Ciri kneeled in front of her. “Hello,” she said as softly as she could.

The little girl looked at her briefly over her skinny fingers, only to hide again even as Ciri smiled at her.

“There, there,” Ciri cooed “It’s okay now, you’re not alone.” To no avail. The girl didn’t stop crying.

In the end, Ciri sat down beside her, and waited.

* * *

Geralt stopped in his tracks, huffing loudly in frustration. He’d been walking for hours—or maybe days—and he’d covered at least a hundred miles with his steps—or maybe just a couple of meters—but he had yet to find an exit, a clue, or just anything that wasn’t more of the same.

Everywhere he looked, it was only cherry blossom trees blurred by the mist.

He turned around, ready to walk a hundred miles back. He didn’t need to. There was the other witcher right in front of him, sitting down with his head held low and his swords loosely tied to his back.

“I need to find my daughter,” Geralt said, his tone coming out more harshly and loud than he intended. “Tell me how I can do it. Tell me how to find a way out.”

The other witcher gazed up at him slowly, as if only vaguely noticing Geralt’s presence even despite all the shouting.

“Tell me,” Geralt repeated. “I need to find my daughter.”

“Who is your daughter?”

“Her name is Ciri.”

“Ah.” His glassy eyes barely focused on Geralt’s form. “I don’t know her.”

Geralt growled almost like an animal, stomping backwards so as to not hit the other witcher with the hilt of his sword.

He took a deep sigh, and crouched in front of the tattooed man. “Did I die?”

“...What?”

“Did I die?” Geralt repeated, putting emphasis on his tone. “Be honest.”

“You don’t look dead to me.”

“What is this place, then?”

“Look around,” the witcher said. “Tell me what you see. Describe it.”

“Stop with this hoax!” Geralt yelled. “Tell me the truth. How did you get here? Where are we?”

“I…” the witcher started, but didn’t finish. He frowned, looking pensive, as if he himself couldn’t remember.

“Are you dead?” Geralt asked.

“Do I look dead to you?”

“Tell me where Ciri is.”

“I don’t know her. I’m afraid you’re looking in the wrong place.”

“What is this place?”

The witcher said nothing.

“At least tell me your name,” Geralt tried, exasperated.

“This place is everything you see,” the other witcher said, “and everything you don’t. What do you see?”

Geralt groaned in frustration.

* * *

“I can help you,” Ciri said after a long time—she didn’t know with precision how much, but if hopping through universes had instilled one thing in her, it was the sixth sense that allowed her to estimate the passage of time.

The girl had finally stopped crying, and was now watching the flower petals falling slowly.

“Can you tell me where we are?” Ciri asked.

The girl said nothing.

“Can you tell me how you got here?”

The girl said nothing.

Ciri felt drained, but still she persevered. “My name is Ciri. What do they call you?”

The girl’s face was blank, but her expression quickly turned gloomy with that question. “Nothing,” she said very quietly, “They call us nothing.”

Ciri didn’t know where to go from there.

They watched the rain of flower petals together.

* * *

Geralt opened his eyes to the blinding brightness of the unknown, but he didn’t squint.

“Tell me, Geralt,” his companion asked, “have you ever loved?”

“Yes,” Geralt answered without hesitation.

“You sound so sure.”

“Because I am.”

“Are you?”

“Yes. Tell me how I can get out of here. I need to find my daughter.”

“How can you find your daughter if you’re trapped here?”

“Precisely. Let me out.”

“Can you see me holding a key? I don’t guard the doors of this place. I have no such power.”

“How do I get out, then?”

The other witcher said nothing.

“I died,” Geralt said.

“You sound sure.”

“Do you have any other explanation?” Geralt snapped. “If I’m not dead, help me get out of here.”

“What do you remember, boy? Before you found yourself here?”

Geralt did squint then. Where had he been? He needed to concentrate, and the exertion of his mind faculties made his head ache. He remembered it all. He remembered nothing. His first year on the Path; sneaking out of Kaer Morhen with the other children in the summer afternoon to bathe on the river; death and destruction; chunks of his heart ripped off; mangled memories; _she was dancing in the night, and death was dancing too_.

“I need to find Ciri,” Geralt said, barely able to contain the desperation in his voice.

He startled when the other witcher suddenly clutched at his arms. “Help me,” the man whined, his desperation matching what Geralt felt. “I need to find her. I need to free her. I don’t know how.”

The man’s grip was too strong, to the point or bruising, but Geralt didn’t notice. He only noticed the _fatigue_ that suddenly took residence in his entire soul. Geralt could barely breathe. It was as if his life was being drained away from him.

He pushed the other witcher away violently, taking a couple of steps backwards. He now knew where he was—or wasn’t. _Shit_.

The other witcher fell to his knees. “I did this to her,” he sobbed, fists clenched in his hair. “I didn’t know. I couldn’t have known. I failed her.”

“Who?” Geralt asked, tentatively. If he were to try and break the curse, he needed the full story. He needed to invoke whatever it was trapping them to the physical plane so he could fight it. A name would be a good start.

“I failed her,” the other witcher whimpered.

“Who?” Geralt pressed on.

“My friend.”

* * *

“You’re still warm.”

“...”

“They won’t let me take any medicine. Or herbs. I can’t get into Cosimo’s quarters without being caught.”

“...”

“I managed to sneak into the kitchens, though. Here. Can you eat it? Jagoda? Can you hear me?”

“...”

“Please. Just try to eat some.”

“...Erland, I can’t. I’ll throw up again.”

“...There’s nothing else in the keep.”

“Water? Please?”

“Fine. I’ll be right back.”

* * *

“Okay, then…” Ciri got up. “Staying here won’t help with anything. We need to go.”

“Go where?”

“Anywhere. Staying idle is no answer for anything.” She opened her palm, giving the girl her best smile. “Let’s go, then.”

The girl eyed her extended hand with distrust, but eventually took it. It was a start.

Ciri looked around. Nothing from any direction, not that she could see very far. The soft rainfall of petals muffled all sounds and impaired her vision. Ciri had the impression she wouldn’t be able to tell if a horde of loud drowners were approaching until they were right on her face.

She closed her eyes and concentrated in feeling the now familiar current of time and space, with its intricate knots and loose ends, trying to find to pinpoint the closest connection she could transport them to. If she could only… 

The little girl gasped, yanking her hand away from Ciri’s.

“It’s okay,” Ciri said, “it’s just a little bit of magic, it won’t hurt you.”

The girl went from slightly frightened to terrified. “Lady, what are you?” she asked in a trembling voice.

“I’m a witcher.” Ciri smiled broadly. “I’ll protect you.”

The girl gasped again. “Impossible. Girls can’t be witchers.”

“Of course they can. Here I am.”

“No,” the girl said, angry now. She huffed, and the flower petals fluttered violently around them. “Impossible. You can’t be a witcher. Girls don’t survive the mushroom concoctions. We all die.”

The smile in Ciri’s face faltered. She remembered mushroom concoctions. She still remembered the taste. “Wait, are you—”

Even the steady fall of flowers wasn’t enough to muffle the deafening, guttural scream.

* * *

“What would you wish for, though? If you found one of those creatures?”

“Them all killed, of course. And you?”

“...Yeah. Yeah, I’d wish for that too.”

* * *

The witcher fell to his knees, fists clenched in his hair. He sobbed and screamed witlessly.

Geralt was panicking. It had been a long time since Geralt last panicked. He understood what was happening, and yet he didn’t.

* * *

Ciri slept at some point. She could tell. She didn’t know what else she could tell.

She dreamed of a griffin. He was watching her without seeing her.

She had only ever felt similarly once.

She found the crying girl in the same place as before—after—sometime. She remembered her but she also didn’t. She thought she knew her, but that was impossible. She felt the girl’s power—calling her, schooling her, draining her. For how long had she been trapped there? How many loops had it been?

“Are you a Source?” Ciri asked.

No answer. The girl only screamed and cried.

 _She wants me dead_ , Ciri thought, her silver sword a reassuring weight strapped onto her back. _She wants us all dead._

* * *

Geralt opened his eyes.

“Look.”

Geralt looked.

“Tell me what you see. Describe it.”

“A field of cherry trees. The petals are falling.” Geralt turned to the man, watching his crazed expression closely. “Why are they here?”

“I planted them in her name. For each time she made me calm. For each laughter we shared. For each year I spent without her. For each moment we could have had. Each lock of hair, each time I thought of her, I planted one. This is all for her.”

“Who is she?” Geralt asked.

* * *

she can’t keep up with it anymore everything is disgusting everything hurts she’ll die she doesn’t want it she has no choice she’ll die it hurts it hurts it hurts she wants Erland she wants out she wants home she to survive she wants none of this to ever have happened too late she’ll die unfair she can’t anymore she hates them all she’ll die she’ll die she’ll die

* * *

The specter screeched as a gust of wind hit Ciri right in the chest. She fell backwards onto a pile of cherry blossoms. The specter didn’t stop there. A second later it was hovering over Ciri, clutching her head between mangled rotten mangled hands, and sucking Ciri’s life energy with a disfigured open mouth.

Ciri managed to push it back with her silver sword—she didn’t slice it; she couldn’t, not while she was still in the specter’s realm, not unless she wanted to die with it. Geralt was probably there as well. She needed to get to him first.

She ran even as dread filled her stomach. Geralt. She needed to find Geralt.

The specter was by her side in an instant, throwing Ciri off her feet with a gust of wind. The calm rain of petals had turned into a storm. Ciri could barely see a palm in front of her.

Still, she fought.

* * *

“Do you think they’ll kill us?”

“Stop talking nonsense. Here, I brought more fresh water.”

“...”

“...Do you want me to read to you?”

“Yes, please. Like you did the other night? Like a story?”

“Sure. ‘Whenever a creature is killed, it’s imperative to burn its body, even if the weapon used was a silver sword…’”

* * *

He opened his eyes to the blinding brightness of the unknown, but he didn’t squint.

He felt relaxed.

He felt lost.

He didn’t remember who he was.

* * *

“You don’t have to do this!” Ciri screamed, begged, fighting her way through the storm of flowers. “I can help you!”

“Lies!” The specter accused in its raspy not-really-a-voice. “You use us. You experiment on us. You choke us. We don’t get to rest. We only get pain.”

“I didn't—“

“You kill us. We don’t even get a proper burial!”

“I wasn’t there! I’m not one of them!”

“Lies!”

“I’m not lying to you!”

The specter only screeched. Ciri was hit and thrown off her feet once more. She choked over a mouthful of petals. She took control of her breathing once more. She got up. She ran.

Whenever the specter approached, Ciri repelled it with the silver sword. Whenever she did, the specter screeched harsher, and the flower storm became worse. Fall, choke, fight, and repeat. Ciri couldn’t annihilate it. Not without annihilating herself. Not without knowing the full story.

There was no way to do it. How could she bring justice to a story that’s been lost in time? A choice: release the girl from her sorrow and condemn Geralt and herself in the process, or or making out of it alive.

She could feel Geralt close; if she could only reach into the Ether for a moment…

* * *

Geralt opened his eyes. Something had awakened him.

It was Ciri screaming his name.

“Geralt!”


End file.
